Discuss The Duality Of Black Folk By W. E. B. Du Bois

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Chloe Smith Professor Luke Southworth English 220-006 24 January 2013 The Duality of Black Folk and Du Bois’ Writing Style W. E. B. Du Bois focuses much of his attention on the theme of duality and twoness. As a white American in the 21st century, I have never faced this idea of having my race be something very different from my nationality. I have felt great sadness, astonishment, terror, righteousness, and a whole range of other emotions when studying our nation’s history with racism, or witnessing examples of racism that still exist today. But I have not had someone explain to me what it feels like to have my identity cut in half. I will never fully understand what it feels like to be a different ethnicity and to be part of “the negro problem,” but Dubois’ words have broken it down for me more directly than any other literature that I have read. “One ever feels his twoness, -an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two…show more content…
Racism and prejudice are obvious problems. By defining the strife and really explaining to readers – white, black, or any other ethnicity – how being black in America was an issue, Du Bois was able to show the problem from the perspective of someone who was actually living it. He repeats the theme of duality and also expresses the damage this duality does when he explains that “this waste of double aims, this seeking to satisfy two unreconciled ideals, has wrought sad havoc with the courage and faith and deeds of ten thousand thousand people” (Du Bois 888). The image of an entire population of black folk having to reconcile their two

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